YouTube nowhere in sight

ISLAMABAD: The government has yet not reached any decision regarding the opening of YouTube that it claimed will be opened soon in the country.

Sources said the government sidelined the issue being powerless on the matter. Moreover it also has received suggestions from some quarters that it was better not to touch the issue as it might trigger controversies and riots again as the site had not yet removed the blasphemous material.

Certain quarters have told the government that at the moment there was no demand from the masses to open YouTube as everyone was using it already by downloading through certain software.

The government has considered it better to leave the decision on the masses. reopening can create a lot of problems as many organisations are ready to protest against its opening saying that it contains blasphemous content.

The government had tried to convince YouTube to remove the blasphemous content from the site which they denied saying it was against policy.

YouTube had advised the government to pave the way for a localised version of YouTube through the law that provides security to sites in case some unwanted incident.

After the struggle of several months, it had to admit that Pakistan Telecom Authority was rightly saying that they did not have any formula to block the content only and open the site.

Then the government realised that there was no way to open the site but making the law, “prevention of electronic crimes”, that was a basic requirement for any international site to operate in Pakistan.

At present it is working on the aforementioned law; the draft has been finalised but due to its engagements in other issues like 3G tech, it has put the issue aside. Sources say that it is expected that the law will be passed at some time in the current year. They said that with the localised version if made possible, the country could also get business apart from making the site bound to remove the material that is against the interests of the society.